


Inauspicious

by snarkypants



Category: Star Trek (2009)
Genre: Friendship, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Trek Women, Women Being Awesome
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-06-09
Updated: 2011-06-09
Packaged: 2017-10-20 06:31:04
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,800
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/209765
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/snarkypants/pseuds/snarkypants
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Commander Pike and Lieutenant One are injured on their first mission together.  Nascent friendship.  Squint and you might see UST.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Inauspicious

**Inauspicious** by snarkypants 

 

 

“Captain, I need to get her out of there,” Pike said, and he could hear Dr. April’s outraged retort before the words even left his mouth.

 

The captain had the comm, though, and relayed her message in his crisp English accent. “You move her now and you could kill her, Commander; Sarah says the compression from the wreckage will keep her blood pressure above the ‘Mendoza line’.” The captain sounded mystified by his wife’s usage of an ancient sports idiom, but repeated her words. “Leave her where she is until we get there.”

 

“Captain April—” he said.

 

“I know; she’s in a lot of pain. But if you’re not equipped for blood loss, you’re definitely not equipped for cardiac arrest.”

 

“Isn’t there anything I can do for her?”

 

There was a pause as April looked to his CMO for a response. “No, Commander; just keep her warm and still.”

 

“Painkillers, anything?”

 

Sarah’s voice broke in, apparently from across the room, but the mic picked it up; she had a carrying sort of voice. “No food, no water, no analgesia, nothing.” He could picture her chopping the air with the edge of her hand as she said it.

 

“What’s your ETA?” Chris asked.

 

The captain was back on the comm. “Roughly eighty minutes.”

 

“That long?” He said it in a tone of voice that clearly stated “ _Shit_ ,” without cursing outright at his CO.

 

“As soon as we’re within transporter range Sarah and her team will be down there with you.”

 

“Acknowledged. Pike out.”

 

“ _Yorktown_ out.”

 

Pike closed the communicator, clipped it to his belt, and just stood there for a moment, his shoulders slumping in defeat. He took a deep breath, scrubbed his face with his hands—only just remembering to avoid his forehead—and crawled back into the wreckage of the shuttle, grunting in pain at the cut on his knee. It felt like kneeling on broken glass; since there wasn’t any glass he figured he must have a shard of metal in there, but that could wait until the med team arrived.

 

The lieutenant’s eyes were closed; Pike had been hoping for her sake that she had lost consciousness until her eyelids fluttered open. She didn’t say anything, but her gaze followed him.

 

It hurt to look at her, now that he had free rein to do so: the fine blade of her nose was flattened and dislocated, blacking her eyes. Her chin and jaw were coated with dried blood. She appeared to have taken the brunt of the crash, but he doubted that he looked much better; the cut on his forehead had bled copiously until he stanched it with a gauze pad.

 

“How are you feeling?”

 

“Hurts,” she whispered, shocked into inanity; the dried blood crackled a little, like the patina on an old painted surface.

 

“Help is coming, Lieutenant,” he said. “They’re on their way. Just hang on.” He scooted around in the cramped space until he lay beside her.

 

She nodded almost imperceptibly. “I’m fine,” she said hoarsely; she was making a concerted effort to steady herself and deepen her breathing.

 

“Is there anything I can do to make you more comfortable?” It was perhaps the stupidest question he’d ever asked in his life, but he didn’t think she’d tell him unless he asked.

 

“I’m cold,” she said. “Thirsty.”

 

“Cold is something I can deal with,” he said, keeping his voice self-consciously hearty. He sat up and grabbed the survival kit from its resting place near his feet, fished around inside the kit and located an emergency blanket, one of those thin sheets of foil folded infinitesimally small by some advanced origami algorithm that he must have missed in calculus. It seemed to take forever to unfold the damned thing; he cursed as it stuck to itself over and over again. Finally he had it sufficiently unfolded to wrap it around her, tucking the ends under her body. She shivered, leaning into his touch, and he couldn’t bring himself to pull away.

 

“Commander,” she said in a thready voice.

 

“Yes?”

 

“I think… I urinated.”

 

He had thought he could smell ammonia, but there were so many other smells competing for the attention of his olfactory nerve, like the ozone of electrical components frying, or the humid, fetid smell of the planet’s surface. “Well, at least you don’t have a full bladder, in addition to everything else,” he said, stroking her hair back from her face; he felt a goose egg near her hairline and used his fingertips to gauge the size of it. “What’s a little pee between friends?”

 

“Friends?” she said.

 

“Aren’t we?”

 

She didn’t respond.

 

“I’ll admit that we don’t know each other very well,” he said. “But we’re on the same shift, same command team, same bridge crew. I know that you’re one hell of a pilot and I’d trust you with my life.”

 

She made a small groaning sound at that, and he interpreted it as regret that she hadn’t been able to prevent the crash. “You did everything you could; do you remember what happened?”

 

“M-mostly,” she said.

 

Some of her hair was plastered to her cheek with dried blood, and he took his time to pry it loose gently. “You gave me the helm while you went aft to try to recycle the inertial dampeners.”

 

“The meteor.”

 

“Yeah; knocked the deflectors out. If you’d been buckled in you’d be walking around right now, assuming we could have somehow survived the impact. That’s the sort of thing that gets you put in for a medal, Lieutenant.”

 

She didn’t say anything for a few moments. “Think I’ll be able to walk again?”

 

He didn’t even have to think about it. “Absolutely. Doc April will have you fixed up in no time.”

 

It was a little weird, almost post-coital, to lay together like this in the semidarkness. All of the elements were there; if you squinted you could see a trembling woman, sticky with sweat and other fluids ( _with damp underwear_ , his brain supplied helpfully), her pupils blown and her hair wild, her breathing uneven and her voice hoarse. He wasn’t even remotely aroused—pain did nothing whatsoever for his libido—but he felt a surge of adrenaline and protectiveness that made his guts hitch.

 

She inhaled, shuddering, and he rubbed her arms. “You are a mess,” he said lightly.

 

“Sorry, sir.”

 

He laughed, but there wasn’t any amusement in it. “You oughtta be sorry; it’s your job to keep _me_ alive.” His voice came out harsh to his ears and he wanted to soften it somehow, but...

 

Her eyes widened. “How far away _are_ they?”

 

“An hour, max.” He didn’t cross his fingers behind his back even though the childish gesture would have been oddly comforting. He was willing to bet that her excellent internal chronometer was temporarily offline, and an hour _sounded_ like significantly less than nearly an hour and a half.

 

She sighed, setting her jaw. “I can survive an hour.”

 

“No, you _will_ survive an hour.” He gave her a lopsided grin. “That’s an order, Lieutenant.”

 

“Aye, sir. I need water,” she said in a burst, as though she’d been keeping back a terrible secret.

 

“I can’t. Doc said—”

 

“Just a drop,” she said. “My mouth is so dry.”

 

“She’ll skin me alive.”

 

“She doesn’t have to know. Please.” Her bright eyes pleaded with him.

 

He sighed. “Just a drop.” He felt for the canteen of water in the survival pack and opened it, dipping his forefinger in the water. “I’m sorry; my hands are filthy,” he said, and she made a noise that might have been amusement. He touched a drop of water to her mouth and watched as the bead seeped between her lips.

 

“Thank you,” she said.

 

“I wish there was something else I could do,” he muttered, screwing the lid back on the canteen; he sure as hell wasn’t going to suck down a drink when she couldn’t. “So what do I call you?”

 

“’Lieutenant’ is sufficient, sir.”

 

“I can’t think of a better time to relax protocol, can you?”

 

She didn’t say anything.

 

“I’ll bet it’s something like ‘Myrtle’ or ‘Helga,’ isn’t it, and you’re too embarrassed to say.”

 

She took a deep breath and said something in a long, multisyllabic fluttering, like the rustling of wings. It was utterly foreign to his ears, but at the same time he thought that he might be able to understand it if he listened hard enough, like hearing whispered voices only just out of range. The Universal Translator didn’t pick it up; the treaty with the Ilyrians didn’t allow it, and skirmishes had been fought over less.

 

“Oh.” Now that he had heard it, he felt uncomfortable, as though he had badgered her to show him her breasts. “Uh, it’s beautiful, but I’ll never be able to say it.”

 

“It’s irrelevant, sir,” she said. “I have no more emotional attachment to the name than you have to your permanent comm address.”

 

“What does it mean?”

 

“What does _your_ name mean?”

 

He had to think about it for a moment, remembering. “My given name means ‘bearer of Christ.’” He looked up at her. “He was a—”

 

“I’m familiar with the history.” There was the barest touch of impatience in her voice.

 

“I guess at one time it denoted religious devotion, but my mother just liked the name.”

 

“And your surname?”

 

“It’s Old English; it could mean a type of fish, or a pointed stick, or a toll road. Or even the top of a hill.” He shrugged.

 

“Which meaning would you choose?”

 

“I’ve never thought about it. Trying to psychoanalyze me?”

 

“ _Quid pro quo,_ sir. The meaning of my name reveals a lot about me.”

 

He exhaled through his nose. “Well. I suppose I’d prefer to be thought sharp and dangerous, like the stick or the fish. But the other origins could indicate taxing and unpleasant.” He grimaced for comic effect, but he was damned if he could make her laugh.

 

She nodded almost absently. “You’re not unpleasant. Sir.”

 

“Well, there you go. Another vote for fish-stick.”

 

“My Ilyrian name is actually my pedigree. It indicates the identity of my sire, my dam, the lab where I was conceived, the team of physicians and geneticists, my natal date, my generation and my crèche; there is also an honorific indicating my level of intelligence.”

 

“Huh. And what do they call you when you’re at home?”

 

The silence stretched out long enough that he started to think he’d hurt her feelings.

 

“I haven’t been home in a very long time, but the diminutive form translates to ‘Number One’.”

 

“’Number One’?” he echoed, mock outraged. “That’s _my_ job.”

 

“Yes, sir,” she said, and he thought he could hear a tiny smile in her voice. “For now.”

 


End file.
